Milwaukee Bucks overcome 26-point deficit en route to win،
MILWAUKEE — The Milwaukee Bucks overcame a 26-point third-quarter deficit to defeat the Portland Trail Blazers 108-102 on Sunday, the NBA’s biggest comeback so far this season.
Trailing 81-55 with 9:08 left in the third quarter, the Bucks finished the game on a 58-21 run, outscoring the Blazers by 32 points for the rest of the game. Milwaukee’s star duo of Damian Lillard (17) and Giannis Antetokounmpo (15) single-handedly outscored the Trail Blazers 32-21 during that span.
Antetokounmpo, who finished with 33 points, broke the tie with a basket with 18.5 seconds left in the game to give the Bucks the lead for good.
“Sometimes we make it difficult for ourselves,” said Antetokounmpo, who finished with 33 points. “Don’t get me wrong, I think Portland is a very good team – a young team, playing hard, but we’re making it difficult. We can’t start the game like that. We shouldn’t be down 26 and then try come win the game. It takes its toll on your body. But at the end of the day, I’m happy we were able to win.
The Trail Blazers had a better than 98 percent chance of winning Sunday’s game in the third quarter, according to ESPN’s win probability analysis, before the Bucks staged one of the biggest comebacks in the recent history of the franchise. It was Milwaukee’s second-largest comeback in the last 25 seasons, trailing only a 27-point comeback against Chicago on November 26, 2012.
“You just have to be resilient and stick with it,” Bucks forward Bobby Portis said. “Things weren’t going our way. We were missing rabbits, layups, turnovers, but we had an opportunity to observe some things at halftime, correct some things, then to go for it in the second half and give it our all.
“No matter how many shots you have, the one thing you can always count on is effort, energy and going out there and playing for each other. I think we did that in the second half.”
The Bucks earned a comeback victory to improve to 12-5 on the season despite the absence of forward Khris Middleton, who missed Sunday’s game with tendinitis in his left Achilles tendon. Bucks coach Adrian Griffin called Middleton daily, but added there was no timetable for his return.
“I think things are promising,” Griffin said before Sunday’s game. “We will see [about playing Tuesday]. We’re just going to continue to evaluate him every day and see how he feels each day. »
Sunday’s game marked the first time in his career that Lillard played against Portland, where he spent the first 11 years of his career. Lillard requested a trade this summer to Portland and was ultimately traded to Milwaukee before training camp began.
Although Lillard came out after Sunday’s game without speaking to the media due to a prior commitment, he acknowledged the strangeness of the matchup with his former team during a postgame interview with Bally Sports Wisconsin.
“Once I walked in, I saw a lot of familiar faces, I thought about going into the visitors’ locker room for a second, but I was like, man, this is a little different,” Lillard, who scored 31 points against his former team, said during the on-court interview. “When we got on the field, I saw everyone and it was a weird feeling. But once we started playing, I got over it quickly.”
Lillard scored 30 in Portland, making him the 15th player in NBA history to score 30 points against 30 different franchises, according to Elias Sports Bureau.
Sunday also marked the second straight game Lillard and Antetokounmpo each scored 30 points, the second pair of Bucks teammates to do so and the first since Marques Johnson and Brian Winters in 1978.
“As the season goes on, we’re going to find ways to play with each other,” Antetokounmpo said. “Be more effective, be more effective with each other, know each other’s strengths. We’re getting to that point. We’re really getting to that point.
“At the end of the day, Queen has to be Queen. I have to be me. As the games go on, we’re going to continue to understand each other. The moment we click to a higher level, it’s going to get even scarier as we move forward.”
